Sassuolo, Italy, December 17-- Based on data presented at the convention of the Tile Association (Assopiastrelle), Italian production of ceramics and tiles stagnated in 2004, according to AGI Online.
Total sales were up a mere 0.4 percent, as a result of a 1.3 percent gain in the domestic market, and null variation of exports, a figure that consolidates the negative result of last year.
Production, managed with great care to avoid surpluses in warehouses, had a drop of 0.3 percent. According to the data, the quantities exported in 2004 varied widely by geographical area.
North America continues to grow (up 5.2 percent), and the EU is once again positive (up 1.1 percent) after years of difficulties. However, there is uncertainty concerning sales of East Central Europe (down 5.4 percent) and the rest of the world (down 6.2 percent).
Another element of worry is the figure on profitability of 2003, which was slightly better than 2002. However, seen in mid term dynamics, it was down. ROE of companies with more than 40 million euro of turnover was 7.1 percent in 1999, while last year it was 4.4 percent. The depreciation of the dollar, together with an increase of oil prices, decreased characteristic margins.
Forecasts for 2005 for the Italian tile industry showed increases in main items (production, total sales and exports), thanks to an improvement of sales on foreign markets that are more in difficulty currently, and a partial slowdown of the domestic Italian market.
Forecasts will translate into a variation of a few million square meters of production, but they will still have to deal with a weak dollar. The use of tiles around the world is now around seven billion square meters, thanks to an increase of 7.6 percent in 2004, after a more limited increase of 4.6 percent in 2003.
